The In-Between

Somewhere, back where I came from, there’s a milk carton with my face on it. I know this because it’s what I’ve heard usually happens with all of us in the In-Between. “Have you seen me?” it will say above a picture of me, probably that awkward one that I had taken for my freshman yearbook, the one I hate but which my mom says is adorable.

Here in the In-Between, it doesn’t much matter what’s Out There. No matter how hard they look, I won’t be found, can’t be found. Even though I can see them, I can stand beside them, I can reach out and almost…almost…touch them…they don’t see me, they don’t hear me, they don’t feel me. Every so often, when I would stand beside my mom and call her name, I could swear she turned her head towards me, as if she could hear me.

Bowen explained to me that that happens sometimes, that he thinks the space between here and there is fragile, at least in places. You ever have one of those moments when you’re sitting in a silent room, and you swear you hear someone say your name, but you turn and look and there’s no one there? Bowen seems to think that’s what might be happening…that someone from the In-Between is calling to someone Out There and getting through, ever so faintly.

We are the In-Betweeners. We exist right alongside everyone else, but slightly off focus sort of. I don’t really know how to explain it. I haven’t been here very long, so just bear with me, and as time goes by, I’m sure I’ll get better at it.

How did I get here? Well, I was walking home from school one day, and as I came up the road toward my house, I turned to wave to my friend Sarah as we parted ways at the end of the street. She turned right, I turned left, and the next thing I knew everything felt “different” somehow, as if I’d stepped into a heavy fog. I felt disoriented at first, but there was this certainty in my gut, deep down, that something about the world had changed, that I wasn’t where I was supposed to be anymore. Looking around me, I was still on my street and I could see my house a short distance ahead, but everything seemed a bit fuzzy at the edges – kinda like when you take the glasses off at a 3D movie.

I thought maybe I was having a stroke or something. I know, I know, 15-year-olds don’t usually have strokes – but you know it happens. I walked up the front steps of my house, felt for the doorknob, and went inside the house.

“Allie, is that you?” my mom called from the kitchen.

“Yeah, Mom,” I answered, dropping my book bag on the floor. “I think – Mom, I think something’s wrong…”

She came into the foyer, wiping her hands on a dish towel and looking towards me. “Allie…” She stopped just short of bumping into me, her eyes seeming to look straight through me at the door. “Well, that’s odd.” She smiled and shook her head. “I could have sworn I heard the door.”

“Mom…” I said, “I’m not feeling well. I think –” She walked away from me back into the kitchen, and I followed.